The research group studies problems involving the flow of thin fluid films, model problems inspired by hemodynamics, colloidal structuring of interfaces, and microfluidics. The lab uses experiments, simulations, and modeling to quantitatively characterize problems and to explore new research directions. Whenever possible, the research group actively collaborates with the industry, scientists and engineers from many fields. For instance, some of the research has been motivated by industrial applications of home and personal care products, oil-field services, fiber coating, float-glass manufacturing, and medical/clinical applications.

Folch Lab (Bioengineering Research Group, University of Washington)

Folch lab focuses on developing microdevices that facilitate the advancement of basic neuroscience and translational cancer applications. Its mission is to make microfluidic devices as intuitive to use as smartphones and make them easily available to biomedical scientists in order to enable novel quantitative experiments, diagnostics, and therapies.
Research interest:

Fujii microfluidic research group has been studying microfluidic devices and microfluidics since it was established in 1999. While the topics range from basic technologies to applied research, in recent years this lab put more and more intense on six research poles:

A large microfluidic platform in Paris between several prestigious French laboratories specialized in microfluidics. Research topics are biochemistry, Cell biology, Colloidal suspensions, Macromolecules, MEMS and nanostructures, Nanobiophysics, Analytical sciences

The dropseq technology comes from this laboratory. It was developed to improve the speed and to lower the cost of sequencing the human genome.

Quake lab (Stephen Quake Microfluidic Research Group, Stanford)

Main research is oriented towards developing new approaches to biological measurement and applying them to problems of both fundamental and medical interest. Areas of interest include genomic diagnostics, systems biology, microbial ecology, and single cell genomics. The Quake valves were first developed in this lab.

Automation, optimization, and miniaturization of chemical and biochemical analyses, with particular emphasis on molecular diagnostics methods.

Fundamental challenges, including combined experimental and theoretical exploration of the coupling between fluid flow, electrostatics, dispersion, mixing, separation, and reaction processes, and the quantitation of chemical species.

Weitz lab (David Weitz Microfluidic Research Group, Harvard)

The lab focuses on study the physics of soft condensed matter, materials which are easily deformable by external stress, electric or magnetic fields, or even by thermal fluctuations. These materials typically possess structures which are much larger than atomic or molecular scales; the structure and dynamics at mesoscopic scales determine the physical properties of these materials. The goal of the research is to probe and understand this relationship. This lab studies both synthetic and biological materials; the interests extend from fundamental physics to technological applications, from basic materials questions to specific biological problems. The techniques used include light scattering, optical microscopy, rheology, and microfluidics.

Whitesides Research Group (George Whitesides, Harvard)

George Whiteside was one of the first researchers involved in microfluidics. The Whitesides research group focuses on microfluidics, soft robotics, adaptive materials, bioanalysis, biophysics dissipative systems and low cost diagnostics.

Wyss Institute (Donald Ingber, Harvard)

The Wyss Institute’s scientific operations are organized around six Enabling Technology Platforms that focus on development of new core technologies and capabilities that will facilitate the explosion of major R&D areas in the field of bioinspired engineering. The platforms integrate multiple faculty members with an advanced technology team, clinical experts, and industrial partners. The Institute platforms are:

Say Hwa Tan (Patrick) research group focuses on developing intelligent microdroplet systems in microfluidics. The group uses various machine learning techniques and active controls to manipulate droplets. The group has established and pioneered different approaches to manipulate droplets using thermal, magnetic, pneumatic, acoustic and electric energy. Past works includes the Microfluidic Jukebox and Dancing Droplets in Microchannels. The research group actively collaborates with the industry, scientists and engineers from different fields and backgrounds. Interested collaborators or students can contact Dr Tan.